Large communities of individuals (e.g., large business enterprises) often cumulatively comprise a large amount of of knowledge relevant to a given topic. However, members of such communities do not always recognize what is known within their respective communities as a whole. Therefore, it may be desirable to facilitate the sharing of expertise, information, and available data in such communities to increase communal awareness and mutual knowledge. This sharing may be referred to as knowledge sharing. Knowledge sharing may include assembling and sharing the collective expertise of a community to facilitate innovation, efficiency, productivity, and so forth. The collective expertise assembled through knowledge sharing may be very valuable because it is typically up-to-date, very extensive, and presented in an appropriate context.
Today's large enterprises in both the public and private sectors often find it desirable to encourage knowledge sharing, both among enterprise members (e.g., employees) and globally, to facilitate the implementation of increasingly difficult solutions. Traditional types of knowledge sharing methods include conferences, meetings, and even conversations around the office coffee machine. What are needed are improved capabilities for capturing knowledge where it exists and converting it into a usable form.